New Year - New Business
 

Give me 50% of the company and I'll tell you :)

Depends on where you are I guess, there are lots of things the town Im in is crying out for and I should imagine would make a tidy profit but within the cities the ideas are already in practice.

Start attending franchise fairs for ideas...... Not recommended a franchise necessarily........

Depends where you are and what your experience is in

it's quite a lot of cash so obviously you're taking professional advice?

there are business counsellors who I've used before, businesslink, i think, google it, and they give you advice, projections, help with plans etc and generally it's free.

Probably a high quality printing press to make very good forged £10 and £20 notes! :D

Seriously a tough one having just resigned as a founding director of a company and been involved with others I tell what you what I wouldnt do:

Start a business with friends/colleagues, everyone does it and it has caused me major problems in two previous enterprises now.
Get equity funding; there are other and less restrictive ways of raising cash for a business should you need it.


So what to go for?
Well it seems to be selling to the consumer market rather than the business market is easier, sure the model is different B2B is fewer and larger transactions than B2C but selling B2B is a hard slog. Perhaps you have a product or service that can target both market sectors. I dont think you need to be unique just offer quality at a reasonable price but check your target market isnt massively over-subscribed, like IT or Telecoms!


Everyone needs to eat so why not have a coffee shop, or even better spend a grand on a jacket potato oven, buy a trailer and pitch up somwhere and keep the rest of your 250k under your mattress :D

I'd buy a big warehouse and fill it with selected goods from China. Then wholesale the stuff with 100% margin. Sort of only half joking on this one.

Property?

Your not wrong there mate - i've been dealing with China for years and the quality has improved dramatically, for instance you can get a DVD player for less than $10 in China!!!!

I've been thinking of doing this myself - and undercutting just about everyone, whilst making a reasonable profit.

The main thing with business is keep an eye on your spending, keep your overheads as low as possible and offer true value for money to your customer.

This is what a guy told my old fella a couple of years ago when my pops asked him what his secret was.

This guy has just sold the Total Fitness chain of gyms and is worth something like 800 million:eek:

If it was me, I'd find somewhere with sufficient demand to warrant opening a small bar. But that's simply because it's my lifelong dream.

very good advice imo, cept the mattress part

I would buy a PoundLand in town center which is always running :D

Being more serious, I would most likely invest in property

Fish and chip shop, a good one.

Or a Costa Coffee type franchise somewhere that doesn't have one and has a god flow of people or tourist trade.

My town is rammed with people in the summer and there isn't even a McDonalds! Missed opportunities here...

Having seen the books for many many types of business I would have to say a pound shop has to give the biggest returns for least effort. I have one client who makes a profit in excess of 100k, he has two employees, 1 accountant and he spends about 2-3 hours a day buying cheap stuff from wherever he can (including China ) and flogging it on at 200-300% markup. All the stuff is complete tat. Last time I met him he was selling those toaster bags for £1.99 for two bags. He was buying them at 2 for 20p and shifting about 500 a week. I rather cleverly pointed out that the toastie bag market in Belfast was fairly limited and he should be careful not to end up with 10000 of the things stuck in his garage. He even cleverlier pointed out that even though they are 're-useable' you can't get them properly clean, so most people who used them just chucked them out and bought more. People don't expect quality for a quid :D

First thing I'd do is ask for advice on Scoobynet...

Porn. Lots of it. Flashing lights aswell. Make sure there's loads of them. Offer a service that no one else does, like a free tissue with ever download. Bound to be a winner :lol1:

On a more serious note, I'd open a brothel, birds with big tits..............

Telecom's mate - been there although it only a very small fraction of what you've got :) and made a good go of it, despite studying and spending money on the side :rolleyes: . No stock to mess around with and with your kind of backing you could easily be mirroring the success of some other telecom's companies I do business with daily - profit in excess of 150-300k within 12 months with massive room for progression.

Drop me an email if you want any more info - jai@air-tel.co.uk

Happy Hunting !!

Jai

Interesting input guys, thanks. :)

I already run 1 business which is nearing it's natural end (40yrs :() so have been drumming up ideas for a 2nd venture. Unfortunately there is no spin off idea possibilities from my current business as the industry has all but gone overseas. The obvious choice of property investment has been given much thought but doesn't really get me going, I want to semi-enjoy doing it as well as earning a living.:D

As stated in the original post, I started this thread more as an opinion poll than anything else as I know SN has quite a cross section of people.

One idea that I have is to convert a very unique old property that I already own into an upmarket Health Club/Gym. The property is IMHO ideally located in a picturesque rural village on a busy A road used by commuters. As many people use their gym before or after work, i feel the location would work well. It is only 6 miles from the nearest town and 10 miles from the nearest city. The major stumbling block with this one is set up cost. I can imagine that the building conversion plus equipment would be more like £750k.

More input?

I looked into this myself (Gym) but the equipment cost is horrendous or you can buy from auction but run the risk of the stuff breaking down all the time and that really p*sses the punters off, i would love to own/run a gym but the returns are not there!!!

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Domino's Pizzas......from about £160k.......Kall Kwik a lot less..........franchises are very good......safer with bags of help.

Try going to G-Mex (Manchester) to franchise exhibition, on 27th and 28th January.

CC